A look back at "Face Off," & the rest of season 4 of "Breaking Bad."

After over a season of conflict there could only be one.

Breaking Bad just wrapped up its 4^th season &… well… it was freaking amazing!  First a look back on the brilliantly named “Face Off,” what the finale means for the characters going forward, & a look back at season 4 as a whole. Spoilers galore (for The Wire & Lost as well) after the break…

This finale produced a number of huge shifts in the world of Breaking Bad. First we have the death of drug kingpin extraordinaire Gustavo “Gus” Fring. Gus, as played by Giancarlo Esposito, will go down as one of the great villains in TV history.* His calm façade made him all the more terrifying as he rarely betrayed any emotion whether he was working the counter at “Los Pollos Hermanos” or cutting a man’s throat. He was also brilliant, contributing to DEA fundraisers while running one of the largest meth distributions in the southwest so that no one, excluding Hank, ever suspected him of a thing. Gus executed a long-term revenge scheme that saw him take down a Mexican cartel & he stayed, at least, one step ahead of Walter White up until his last moments. Alas Gus is done in by his need for revenge on the final man responsible for the murder of his business (& maybe more?) partner Max, Tio Salamanca. As Salamanca turns the tables on Gus, with the help of Walt’s home made explosive, getting his own revenge for Gus’s involvement in the deaths of his remaining family.

*For my money he’s the greatest fictional drug dealer, sorry Stringer Bell, & the second best villain behind Ben Linus of “Lost.”

Has there ever been a better death scene on a television show? To be sure there have been some great ones. LOST produced a number of extremely moving death scenes, most notably Charlie, Juliet, & Jack’s. 24 killed of a lot of characters, none more shocking then Terri Bauer’s in literally the closing moments of season 1 with the fantastic silent clock count to end the season. The Wire seemed to have a defining death scene in every season & was able to make each one tragic for different reasons. Gus’s though sets itself apart in that we all but know it’s coming, as he or Walt must go & it seemed unlikely Breaking Bad would kill of its main character with 16 episodes remaining. Smartly the show only confirms this by giving Gus a close up followed by sweeping, spaghetti western style, music as he walks towards the nursing home to kill Tio. We’re prepared for him to die & then when the bomb goes off we assume that’s it. Of course we now know it’s not. Gus walks out of the Tio’s room, seemingly unharmed & characteristically adjusts his tie (an absolutely beautiful touch).* That is before the camera pans around to show half of his face is gone & he collapses to the floor dead.** I have no idea if it would be medically possible for someone to survive for those last few moments but, does it matter? Gus was an epic, larger than life, character & his death needed to match. This suited him perfectly.

*At this moment my reaction was some combination of: Oh my gosh! Shit! What the fuck! You’ve got to be kidding me! Gus is un-killable! I love him! That was awesome!

**At this point my reaction was: Shit! Oh my gosh! What the fuck! You’ve got to be kidding me! That was insane! I love this show!

Obviously the second big revelation was that Walt poisoned Brock. To me it was obvious that Walt’s assertion that Gus had done the poisoning was nonsense. Gus had far too many ways he could kill Walt to need to try & manipulate Jesse into doing it by poisoning a child. Instead I battled between the two other possibilities: Jesse was wrong about the ricin cigarette & Brock had in fact taken it out of his pack, or Walt had done it in order to enact his own elaborate scheme. I felt that Walt was the guilty party as he continued down his path of darkness, but couldn’t come up with an entirely satisfactory explanation of how he’d done it. Well my initial reaction proved correct, even if creator Vince Gilligan’s explanation* for how he pulled it off wasn’t entirely satisfactory. Walt is now clear to become an even more powerful member of the meth trade**(he’s also clear to walk away, but that’s not happening). If Walt hadn’t already, he has now clearly passed the point of no return & become the villain of the show. Endangering the life of an innocent child is not something Walter White would’ve been even remotely okay with at the start of the series but now it seems he’s more Heisenberg than Walt, which can’t be good for any of the other characters.

*Gilligan gives a complete look back at the season at the AV Club, which also features interviews with much of the cast. 

**One thing that could hold Walt back is the possible recurrence of his cancer, which I feel is likely.

Speaking of the other characters, this episode set up some very interesting storylines for them in the future. Skyler finally realizes the full danger of the business Walt’s in, & that he may be the most dangerous man of all (she doesn’t know that Ted Beneke is dead yet though does she?). Hank is vindicated in his assertion that Gus was at the top of the meth trade, & with this he should have more support in the final season as he searches for Heisenberg. Saul may be feeling a lot safer now but considering he seems to have been partially complicit in Brock’s poisoning that feeling may be ill founded. Mike is still recovering in Mexico & will no doubt return none too happy to learn his boss has been murdered by Walt, something Walt would be wise to remember. Then we have Jesse…

Jesse has once again been manipulated by Walt, & for the second straight season that has meant him being involved in murder (to be fair when Jesse shot Gale it was to save his own life as well). When Jesse learns that Gus was not responsible for Brock’s poisoning it’s clear he’s bothered when he asks Walt, “Gus had to go though, right?” When Walt replies in the affirmative* Jesse seems relieved but, I doubt that will last long. Walt has now let Jesse’s girlfriend Jane die, & poisoned Brock (I think the latter would be worse in Jesse’s mind). These are the type of sins that at some point Jesse will learn of & Walt will have to answer for.

*As much as I loved Gus, Walt is right-if not for the right reason. Walt surely views his own survival as most important but for me Gus’s putting a hit out on Hank meant he had to go. At this point Hank is essentially the hero of the show.

Some thought season 4 started too slow. With early episodes focusing on Walt’s helplessness in the face of the rare adversary who was smarter than him, Jesse stuck in a guilt spiral for killing Gale, & Hank struggling to recuperate from his wounds at the hands of the cousins. I thought these complaints were ridiculous. Even if I had little idea where it was all leading I had learned enough from the previous 3 seasons to know that this was all leading up to one heck of an end stretch. Beyond that those early episodes continued to give us entertaining looks at the characters. Unlike many other shows, that would’ve forgotten about it 2 episodes later, we saw Jesse deal with the repercussions of taking a man’s life, culminating in his breakdown at the 12-step meeting. Hank lashed out at the one person he shouldn’t have in Marie, & through it all Marie never stopped supporting him even if she did succumb to her kleptomania to escape. Skyler dealt with becoming involved in her husband’s criminal enterprise to protect her family. & Walt dealt with being powerless for much of the season, making his final triumph more satisfying. Well… I liked Gus more than Walt so maybe satisfying isn’t quite the right word, but you get the idea.

Then from episode seven (“Problem Dog”) on Breaking Bad unleashed a series of masterpieces as we learned more about Mike & especially Gus (his mass poisoning of the cartel was as satisfying a moment as the show has had), Hank caught the scent of Gus, & Jesse & Walt’s loyalty to each other was challenged. At that point every proceeding episode seemed to top the previous one (though for my money “Crawl Space,” ending with Walt cackling underneath the house was the best of the season), giving us one of the best seasons in TV history (more on that in a later post).

Was it ultimately better than the superb season 3? I’d say yes. Season 3 had Walt much more front & center (which I have no problem with as Bryan Cranston is amazing), but I thought this season’s expansion of Gus & Mike’s characters constantly called into question who we were in fact rooting for within the show*, making it a richer, more interesting viewing experience. Just try & think of another show as morally complex, & well acted, as Breaking Bad?** Is there one on today? Has there ever been? I watch a lot of TV & I’ve yet to see one.

*I found this season that my loyalty lies with Jesse first & foremost.  
**"The Wire" may be as morally complex but, the acting, & direction for that matter, of "Breaking Bad" are unparalleled.